


Don't Rewrite My History

by fffan201



Category: Take That (Band)
Genre: Drama
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-14
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-03-04 21:44:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 16,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13373655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fffan201/pseuds/fffan201
Summary: The year 2012 was the best for Gary and the worst thing he had ever experienced and had to go through. But what if he mourned not only for his fourth and still-born child, but also had to fight with the loss of his beloved wife Dawn. In this initial sad and right-handed story, Gary is hit by a very hard reality and gets completely out of the line. ... Will he ever get over this loss and how will his future life continue?





	1. Prolog - When A Heart Is Broken There's Nothing To Break

**Time was all we had  
But it was never ours to keep  
Time can help you find the ground and knock you off your feet  
All those minutes get lost in time**

 

Now nearly one year had passed when Gary had to resign himself to the worst tragedy of his present life and this with the best will in the world tried ones anyhow to take. Even today he still had to resign himself his difficulties with his destiny. How could he find his way back into life when this was no longer existent? There was pure nothing at all more for which it was still worthwhile to life. From a purely external point of view, the Take That singer seemed so today, at least, when he went into the public, as if nothing had happened. But as well as anyone who had carefully tracked the news about Gary's person and thus knew about his dilemma, it was already clear that this was not the case and that this façade threatened to crumble.

No matter whether a normal citizen of this earth or a fame person something like that had to experience with, for everybody a stillbirth was simply very difficult to process. The loss of a child was quite tragic enough, however what is even if still in this birth the mother and beloved wife lost her life? For Gary, in any case, who had to take therefore the loss of two beloved people at the same time this was like an end of the world. How should he find there one day again the way back in the life if under his feet the ground had opened and tore him in a deep hole where he could not put out sometimes the smallest spark of light? Besides, this awful darkness provided for him the feeling that he had lost to any meaning and he existed therefore in this eternal nothing only as a lie, almost already like a lost memory. It was almost like in the “Never Ending Story” that Gary had read in his youth.

Although Gary withdrew more and more of the world and vegetated away in this nothing, he still had, besides, the heavy job and he had to look after his three children and be there. In the beginning he had tried still to be a good father, however, with the time the forces necessary in addition dwindled to him visibly and thus he slowly lost the relation to the reality. Because Gary's mother could not see how her youngest son withdrew from everything and he neglected his children more and more, she briefly contacted the other guys around TAKE THAT and wanted them to be more than just a watchful eye at Gary, while children found accommodation for the time being with her. Although she was aware that this would not be easier for the children if they were separated from their father, but the three also needed a trusted reference person to rely on were taken sometimes now and then in the arms.


	2. I Don’t Wanna Conversation With Nobody

All this had now been almost a year ago and since then nothing had done itself a lot. Gary's three children still lived with his mother, while Gary was still struggling to find their way back into their daily lives. Although he made a better impression today to the outside than in the beginning, but only Gary alone knew how it actually looked inside him. So far his four friends had had a lot of patience with him, but they had the feeling that Gary could finally take a step forward. It would not harm him in any case. A sign of the improvement was unfortunately not in sight and so the four had to continue to exercise patience. In doing so, the boys really did everything to stand her common friend and from this hole which strove for his life and with all power tried to keep him in his catches to get out again. But on a beautiful warm day in late July, the leaf should turn and give the whole a new direction.

 

On this one day, the four guys met for a long time again in Gary's garden and tried together and with united forces to bring their friend to front man and other thoughts. While Gary sat quietly, with his legs drawn, at the head of a long table, his empty gaze glided more and more into the distance, and with the help of the rising sun, this icy feeling of his deep-seated and ever-present melancholy fell into the farthest corner of his brain. Even though his mind told him that he was going to break up and live his normal life, his heart made a huge dash. So this inner cold continued to persist, and Gary did not even give her the chance to get a better feeling of life from the warming sun.

Beside Gary sat his good friend Jason, who had been more than a good support to him since Dawn's death. Since this was the only one who had not founded a family of his own yet and didn’t want to know Gary alone, he had moved to him. Gary definitely needed someone at his side, who was always there for him and taking care that his friend did not make life-changing stupidities. Therefore, it would have been irresponsible to leave him completely alone in this condition. Although Jason knew quite well that his buddy had rational fears before and thus not even dreamed of doing such drastic measures, but there was a small residual risk, which of course he did not want to go. With this golden-tone decision, he was able to help Gary better and act as a speech-pipe between the parties. What has also been very helpful so far.

"A nice day today, isn’t it?" Jason tried to lure the wordless Gary with a meaningless subject.

Gary shrugged her shoulders and continued to wrap himself in a cloak of silence. Gary had not spoken a single word for countless months. Not even the smallest note came over his lips. This disturbing but also understandable silence of him, more and more troubled the people in his immediate surroundings. The more time passed, the worse it was.

But as Gary didn’t get up close to his simple attempt to do so, Jason sighed loudly. Gradually, he finished with his Latin, finally, to bring his friend at last to other thoughts. He had really tried everything, but nothing had helped. Not even a visit to his children two months ago. It was really desperate. If Gary didn’t take a step forward as soon as possible, he saw black for his mate. From this point of view, he had reached the end of the line by summoning Howard, Mark, and Robbie, and invited them here. Perhaps they managed together to convince Gary that he was no longer staying in the past and was to resume his normal life. Of his three friends, Howard and Mark were already present. While the two stood a little apart from each other and occasionally exchanged a few words, they were just waiting for Robbie to finally arrive and complete the quintet. But that doesn’t take too long. Because normally was Robbie, in contrast to Mark, mostly punctual. The Mark today even times before the actually settled time here struck was also only because he had picked up Howard from the airport and drove directly here. As soon as Jason had asked himself where Robbie remained, the door bell announced to a visitor.

"Maybe that's probably Rob." Jason said more so by the side, then stood up to allow his buddy to enter.

 

So Jason went into the inside, toward the front door, and opened it when he saw the image of a Robbie standing with his outstretched arms in front of him and with a cheeky grin the first line of the Refrain to _Could It Be Magic_.

"Baby I want you to come, come, come into my arms."

This one line moved Jason to embrace Robbie and let him in Gary's "humble hut".

"Hey, Rob. It’s nice to see you again, instead of hearing your voice only through a thin telephone cable. Come in."  
"I feel the same way. It's been a long time since the last time we were to five." Robbie recalled.  
"That’s should be around two years ago now.” Jason knew exactly when it had been, and shortly thereafter a more serious expression, his dissatisfaction was more than just expressed, "However, I wish that our present together would become something in better time and under more pleasing circumstances."  
"I totally agreed with you. ...What does it look like? Is Gaz doing so well?" Robbie wanted to know right away, in a worried voice, how it was about his friend.  
"If only I knew. …Come. Look at yourself and get a picture of yourself." Jason pondered himself in the dark and did not really know what to say to Robbie.

On the way to the others, Jason asked Robbie how he was doing. He only mentioned that everything was in order and that his daughter, who almost a year ago saw the light of the world, kept him constantly on his toes. Whereupon Jason only thinks that he envies him. Not because of the fact that he didn’t have children of his own, but rather that he was no longer good about Gary's fearful silence.

"And he still plays the silence of the lambs?"  
"Not even a word." Jason openly expressed his frustration.

 

Shortly after, the two came out into the garden, where Howard was still a bit lost in his thoughts and Mark had now joined Gary’s side. Everyone had his method to deal with this situation. While Mark tried to be a good friend to Gary by giving him an open ear and wide shoulder, Howard had so much more his problems with that. Although Gary was his best friend and would do everything possible for him, but it was so very painful for him to see him. Just sitting around so silently had never been his thing. When Howard and Mark Robbie looked at Jason's side, their faces brightened instantly and suddenly, hurrying to their already-missing buddy. Since Mark had to travel a shorter distance, he was therefore the first and closed his bigger friend, who was two years younger, into a close embrace. After the two had loosened themselves from their friendly hug, Howard did the same to Mark and also made him know by the way that he was happy to face him again.

"I'll find too, mate. I also find it." Robbie said in the hug, slapped him a few times cheering on the back and added in his thoughts that he did it mainly for Gary.

Okay, beside Mark, today also a Howard and Jason to his best friends. But his special connection to Gary, he would no longer want to miss in the world or even exchange for something else. Gary had now become an important part of his life. ...So, with those thoughts, he'd come out of the embrace with Howard, and then try to gain his attention. In order to get them, Robbie went to his knees shortly afterwards with Gary to be on the same level.

"Hey, Gaz. ...Is everything okay with you, mate? Do you have a hug for me too, or do I have to hug myself?"

Although Gary's empty gaze was still the endless expanse and he had really lost himself in the deep blue of the sky, he at any rate perceived the voice of his very good friend Robbie in his cotton-covered ears. For a brief moment, he let himself be absorbed by the distant world before him, until he finally turned his gaze, not closing his tired eyes for ten seconds. When he opened it, he looked straight into the green eyes of his friend. However, the eye contact of the two was not exactly endured. After only three four seconds, Gary had broken this off and then turned back to the distance. Somehow he could not grant Robbie this favor. It just was not. Although he loved Robbie about everything and would love to take him in his arms, but something was there that prevented him from doing so. There was no lack of competence. How high was the probability that it could’ve more to do with the person around Robbie himself?

As Gary was not even responding to his request, Robbie straightened and sighed more than just a worried look. This really worked like a shadow of himself, where even the light of the world could not get him out of this darkness and reawaken with a new life. Gary was like a prisoner in his own body. What Robbie was make pretty sad. To see his best friend, the heart broke. So that he could at least give himself a better feeling, he did not allow him to simply close him in his arms and the expected reply was missing at all. After releasing Gary from his embrace, the concern for his friend grew steadily, and so Robbie gradually began to get anxious. This disturbing and frightful silence with which Gary surrendered was more than just worrying. Yes, almost frightening. Robbie understood all too well that Jason was currently giving up with a hyperactive child and therefore a change. Even if the latter had been thinking about leaving the band since the end of the Progress-Tour, and had an eye with a career as a psychiatrist, Robbie was wondering if he really wanted to. While he was asking this one question, he exchanged an intense look with Jason, where it could lead to a headache. Before they even came to it, the two of them turned their gaze and didn’t know how to deal with this situation. While Robbie had trouble getting to grips with the unrelated embrace, Jason didn’t understand why Gary Robbie had denied it. Even if Jason was just bothering about his brain bends, he did not care what Gary was doing to ignore Robbie's friendly gesture.


	3. No Self-control And No Reason Why

He was just about to seriously and intensely deal with the question, when suddenly the door bell was thrown again.

"Who can this be then still? I thought you'd just quoted us three here, or did you invite Gary's Mum?" Howard asked Jason if he had invited a mysterious person.  
"How can I know this? And no, Marjorie doesn’t know anything about our meeting." Jason could only say with shaking head and wanted to get ready to tell the mysterious visitor that it was an unfavourable time.  
"Stay with Gary. I'll do it." Robbie offered Jason, just because of this, to come up with other thoughts, to open the door for him.  
"Thank you." Jason accepted the offer, then turned to his silent friend, trying to figure out a sympathetic voice after Robbie had gone inside, so he cut him like that, "Gaz? ...Hey! Come on, buddy. What's happening? Do you have any problem with Rob?"

As usual, Jason asked him the questions so that Gary could answer them only with a nod or shake. But there’s nothing came. Not even a traitorous wink. He still stared with a blank look into the distance, but his eyes seemed a bit watery. Jason wouldn’t be surprised if, at any moment, he gave one or the other tear the passport and thus rolled over his cheek. Cautiously, he put a hand on his shoulder, pressed briefly again and gave Gary a moment of silence. Except for the near and distant birdsong, no other sound was heard. If you really put everything around you on mute, the word of silence got a completely new meaning. The one would surely call it a dead silence, but in the presence of Gary this word was absolutely wrong. Let's say it this way ...the comparison with the eternal silence before the Big Bang would perhaps be more appropriate.

"I do not want to tell you what to do or leave, but please, give me some answer in whatever form. I would also appreciate it if you spoke again. We all miss the sound of your beautiful voice. ...So please, do me the favor." Jason then broke the silence and made it clear to him how they wanted to hear Gary's voice.

At this request, Gary couldn’t pick up an answer, but he let his gaze glide over to Jason until they looked into each other's eyes. No sooner had the two made a handy and intense eye contact, which brought Gary down after a few seconds for the provisional and repeated time. When Jason saw in his eyes, Jason thought he could read that Gary wanted to keep silence.

"Please Gaz. Somehow you have to start talking again. If you don’t speak, you'll be introduced to a psychiatric institution and I can hardly imagine that you really want that. ...You know I'm on your side and the other guys here too. Rob included. And believe me, none of us wants to see you in such a questionable environment that isn’t even worthy of you. ...Think of your children, too. What should Daniel, Emily and Daisy please do if their father is vegetated in such an institution? For heaven's sake, don’t do this to the three. ...I beg of you, Gaz. Speech. Even, if it’s just a single word." Jason appealed to Gary's conscience, giving him the presumed consequences of what would happen if he didn’t finally begin to raise his voice again.

But even to this speech, which could happen to him in the future, Gary was not even impressed by the slightest lethargy. As Gary didn’t care, Jason let his head hang a little frustrated and rubbing his own neck slightly. His friend made him even more difficult than it already was. Although this one of him still managed to do something and did this occasionally, at least if it was purely physical, what Jason wanted from him. No more. It was almost desperate.

As Howard put himself behind his best friend, put his hands on his shoulder and began massaging them, he only said that it was a hard work to get Gary back on the legs and in the right direction to steer. Mark also agreed with him and noticed that it was almost as impossible as a joint work.

"How did you ever imagine the whole thing? ...I mean, how are we supposed to make Gaz finally take a step forward?" For Mark this dilemma was considered to be unsolvable.

Jason took a quick look at Mark, then turned it back down to Gary and wanted to tell his two friends just how they could do it together and with combined forces when suddenly Robbie came back to the small group.

 

"Hey guys. Here I am. ...This was just the postman and gave a package here." He said as he stepped out of the huge building and went to the side of Gary.

Except for Gary, of course, they all turned to him and wondered what Robbie was wearing on his arms. It was actually his little, almost one-year-old daughter, Teddy! This ominous stranger who had ranged at the door had therefore had to be Ayda and had simply pressed their common child into his arms.

"You really call your little girl a package?" Howard wondered.  
"Why not? She's my best present next to Ayda, so that's all right." Robbie explained to him about his point of view.  
"Hey, my little one. Well, do you remember on your Uncle Mark?" Mark did not take the little Teddy to drive with a bent finger over his fist-pack, whereupon she smiled at him and said to Rob, "Your Teddy is really cute, but she doesn’t come to my little India Fox."  
"Just as you mean. But who doesn’t see his own child as the sweetest thing in the world?" Robbie didn’t resent his buddy, who preferred his own and youngest daughter.  
"And what’s about your uncle Howard? Do you have a little smile for me, too?" Howard could not help it, just like Mark was like his cuteness, and Teddy cautiously put a small kiss on the nasal tip and then gave her his broadest grin.

While Howard and Mark could not tear themselves away from the small Theodora, Jason had his doubts and somehow got a bad feeling about the whole thing. What he brought up then also openly.

"Um. Nothing’s for nasty, Rob. Do you really think this is a good idea to have your daughter here? How could you get her from Ayda simply pushed her into your arms?"  
"She left me nothing else. She simply pushed her into my arms and said that it was no different. Her explanation is that she had just received a call and was given a supporting role for an English film, which she had been on for two months. In order to make everything formal and official, she had to look up right there and there she could be bad with a toddler. ...And before you ask, my parents are just out of country. She hadn’t had a choice." Robbie tried to explain why Ayda had passed him her daughter and pushed her into his arms.  
"And why didn’t she call you back on mobile phone and has ordered back home, so you could take care of the little one until she came back?"  
"Haven’t you just listened? Ayda was supposed to get there immediately. Do you seriously think that she'll leave Teddy alone at home while I come along hair-raising on the way back?"  
"No. Of course not. ...But now that I think about it, she could have brought her to Emma too, since Teddy could have been a playmate." Jason had to be right in his concern and also thought aloud about a possible alternative.  
"Again true, you could indeed think about that." Robbie found the idea not so bad.  
"That wouldn’t have brought her much." Mark interrupted.  
"Why? What do you mean? ...Thanks." Robbie didn’t quite understand what Mark wanted to say, leaving quite thoughtlessly his daughter to Howard, who simply took her out of his arms and thanked him for that.  
"Because Emma with the children are with their parents." He told the two about the momentary absence of Emma.  
"Do you have more options in stock, or should I just give up my daughter for adoption?" Robbie then turned back to Jason, obviously strained and annoyed by him now.  
"Then you'll get a nanny. Money is enough for you, if you are concerned." Jason pointed out to the only and true good alternative.  
"Ayda and I have already discussed this. None of us wants to throw Teddy into the hands of another woman. No. You can forget that. My daughter will definitely not have in any hand’s that doesn’t belong to the family." Robbie refused to worry about it.

 

At all the time Jason, Mark, and Robbie were talking about the presence of the youngest family member, and possible alternatives for his whereabouts, Gary had also discovered the little Teddy. While he held her tightly in his eyes and could no longer turn his gaze from her, Gary had to think of his small and dead Poppy on an involuntary basis and every second. If she was still alive today and wouldn’t have taken her mother with her, she would be the same age as Teddy and the Barlow family couldn’t be happier to live a tranquil life. But unfortunately it wasn’t so. Instead, everything was completely different and while, his three other children lived with his mother, he had declared himself a prisoner of his own, and was only vegetating.

...Anyway, looking out of this prison and staring at the little Teddy's face, the tears again gathered in his eyes, whereupon one of them found the way out and was kissing his cold cheek. Suddenly the emptiness felt even more intense than usual and the cold around him, a new definition that made him shudder. In order to be able to escape from this condition, his actions took control of his thinking within a very short space of time, and a strange arm, though it was his own, suddenly moved toward Teddy, where the corresponding hand stretched out a finger. Without a long time, Teddy grabbed his finger, which caused a warm and warm shower in Gary and he closed his eyes for a moment to enjoy this long-missed feeling better. Through Teddy, he got back a little bit of vitality, and in his dark world, a ray of light actually arose for a moment. However, Gary was not granted for too long, because instantly all heat was withdrawn from him, and the eternal nothing really did to keep him in his prison forever. But before the darkness called him his own again, Gary tried his hand at a last and desperate rescue action by grabbing for a rope that was suddenly there and pressing it firmly against his body so as not to have to dwell again in this icy darkness.

While he clung to this last straw, Gary didn’t even notice how he took Teddy's hand and thus robbed her of Robbie's arms. Like this imaginary rope, he pressed the little body of Theodoras close to his chest and enjoyed all the warmth that emanated from her. It was really good to hold her in his arms. With his eyes closed, he even imagined that Teddy was his Poppy, and when that thought became his own daughter, Gary finally pressed her tightly to his chest, until Teddy suddenly screamed and began to cry. Since Gary didn’t know what he was doing to her, he whispered only to himself and the little person in his arms, a few words: "Sch ...Keep calm, Poppy. Everything’s alright. ...Daddy is here. You need not be afraid."

 

When suddenly the cry of a toddler filled half the estate, the friends were torn from their easy lethargic and intense conversation, and their eyes also fell immediately upon a picture, which they were not all good. Instead of Robbie's arms, his daughter was now in more than a simple hug with Gary. The girl really screamed for her life and Gary still didn’t notice what he was doing to her. He still held her so firmly that Teddy couldn’t even move and thus demanded something from her little body, which should definitely not be done to her.

Presently, Robbie was white as a wall and tried to free his little princess from Gary's embrace with the help of the other guys. However, Gary clung so much to Teddy that it was almost impossible to fight her out of his embrace. No matter what they did, whether with energetic grips or any art of advocacy, nothing could move Gary to finally release screaming girls. In the meantime it had become a real fight, where the guys had to go over to the slightest hassle. But what wasn’t exactly successful. But gradually the whole thing became a test for Robbie, who wanted to finally get his daughter back to his safe arms. Soon afterwards, his fear of Teddy and the rage on Gary merged into an explosive mixture that searched for a suitable outlet. This high-caliber and dangerous primal force in one, suddenly unburied itself out of nowhere and finally found its way into Gary's face. Without thinking about what he was doing, Robbie had missed his best friend as if out of the blue. Shortly afterwards, Gary also pressed a hand on his right facial, distorted and painfully distorted, and tried to endure the pain that arose. Before Robbie became aware of what he had done, his joy was great that his impact turned out and Gary finally released his daughter. The following protested voices, as ignored by a Howard, Jason or Mark, around him, he immediately took the still screaming Teddy in his arms, gave her some calming words, and after she had calmed down, he turned finally at Mark and pushed the little one into his arms. No sooner was his girl in the arms of Mark, he turned directly to Gary, and while he shouted at him with some insults, Robbie couldn’t restrain his fierce anger, and missed Gary another blow to the other half of the face. In this second stroke, Robbie had so much force that his opponent went down with the chair.

If Gary had not pressed his chin to his chest, the fall on the hard rock would have become ugly. As he pressed both hands on his ashen and pompous face, he tried to make any kind of pain go over him. The physical pain also had something good. By the pure physical, he could forget his psychical for a vague moment. But this pain didn’t last very long, leaving Gary in the deepest hole after a few seconds. All the worried and disturbed voices around him, he didn’t even notice. How, if this new hole swallowed every conceivable of sound? The only thing that pierced his ears was his own aggravated breathing, from which all kinds of pain were heard. Shortly afterwards, he felt a slight pressure on his chest, which did not harm him. At least, purely outwardly. But inwardly it looked very different. Through this one touch, Gary had the feeling that in his heart a never-ending forest blaze blazed, destroying every single memory of Dawn and Poppy forever. This heat, coming from this touch, made him almost mad. What was determined by this was that he intensified his mental pain even more, and that he wanted to gain relief in the fastest way. Just because of Dawn. He could not give up his beautiful memories of her so easily, leaving her to the fire. No. He didn’t want to do this to her and above all for himself. In order to stop this fire, he tried to get on his two shaky legs, and then, when he had a firm stand, ran away with tears.

While Jason Robbie reproved and Mark stood with Teddy on his arms a bit strangled next to him, Howard went straight to the side of his down-to-earth friend, who appeared to be something under shock. With a quiet voice and a few well-thought-out words, Howard dared to try to calm him down, and asked whether things were all right with him. If Howard was honest with himself, he hadn’t expected to get an answer. He couldn’t blame Gary either. In order to be able to help him at least something, and thus give Gary the feeling that he was there for him, he calmly put a hand on his chest. But what did not even help in the approach. It was rather be the opposite. On his touch, Howard looked at him as though he was overrun by all the emotions. Gary whispered, shortly afterwards, on his two shaky legs, and with a few steps into the interior, where he was already swallowed by the darkness. Since Howard didn’t want to know him alone, and so easy to run away, he stuck behind him at his heels and tried to keep up with Gary.


	4. How Did It Come To This

At first, Jason wanted to follow Howard and Gary, but he was so torn from the new situation that he stood there as if rooted. Not knowing who to look after. On the one hand, Gary needed someone to trust him, but on the other he felt the greatest desire to tear Robbie's head off. But knowing that Howard was already on the point to keep Gary out of sight and to keep him aside, Jason left his first thought and turned to Robbie. Since Jason Howard was blindly trusted by one hundred percent, Gary was very well cared for in his hands.

"Tell me, do you have them all? How do you get on the stupid idea of Gary missing a left-right combination?" Jason could no longer restrain himself.  
"Have you ever heard of the saying? The end justifies the means? If I had not, Gary would certainly have had my daughter on his conscience. I don’t give a fuck on it to me what do you think of me now, but I hang very much at my little Teddy. I cannot allow someone to get involved in my life, and perhaps to look after her live. She is almost a year old and I don’t feel the slightest desire to carry her to the grave. …Okay. I admit that the second blow might have been maybe too much, but what else should I’ve done?" Robbie tried to explain his point.  
"Only maybe? This was definitely too much. The first blow I can just understand, but the second is for me an absolute no-go. In addition, the fall could have easily backfired. ... No offense and don’t understand this now please not wrong, but it was really unnecessary as the presence of your daughter. If I were you, I would’ve simply taken her, got into the car and drove home without thinking. Then everything would never have happened. ...And as for your argument, what is Gary to say, please? Do you think he had the greatest desire to want to say goodbye to two loving people? It's not easy for him to have a look like two of his best friends ..." Jason Robbie let the second hit take a deadly end, trying to get him to understand that Gary this fate had certainly not been chosen by himself, until, on the basis of a thought, he interfered himself in the midst of the sentence.  
"What? What’s wrong? Why are you interrupting in the middle of the sentence?" Mark immediately noted that what was wrong and wanted to hear the end of the sentence accordingly.  
Jason ran a hand through his face and wondered why he hadn’t come to it immediately. How could he be so blind? He should’ve it known better. This was the explanation he had made himself shortly after the arrival of his friends.  
"Now I know why Gaz only returned Doug's embrace and not yours." Jason said more to himself.  
"And why?" Mark wanted to know right away, like Robbie did the same thing.  
"Wait a moment. ...He didn’t respond to yours either?" Robbie then turned to his much smaller friend, whereupon he could only nod him frustrated.  
"Anyway, Poppy would be about the same age as India and Teddy. ...Gaz sees in the two his own little daughter. ... I cannot help thinking about how much it will hurt him if he sees you both in the eyes and realizes how happy you are with your offspring and families." Jason let the two of them know with a hoarse voice, so Gary not able to reciprocate their embraces.

To this plausible explanation, Mark and Robbie could only look in the eyes of the other for a brief moment and suddenly felt something like this from the wrong place. If they had known that before, then...

"Don’t. Fuck. ...And I donkey also scatter salt in this wound." Robbie cursed himself as he condemned his hard-bitten eyes for a moment and tried to rub this sudden sluggishness out of his eyes with three fingers.

Only now was Robbie really aware of what he had done to his best friend. Although the first blow had served its purpose and didn’t give him a lot of feelings of guilt, the second one did. However, this one and last blow quickly became secondary as he thought about what he had triggered with the presence of his daughter at Gary. What he had done with him now was more than extremely painful to him, and he would, in favor of his friend, seek as far as he could, and at least be able to help him with his absence. His existence and especially his daughter's, only harmed Gary and he had sworn himself to never want to hurt him again. Neither in the physical nor in the soul senses. To his suffering, however, he had given him the complete all-around package. ...What he hadn’t even intended.

"There is also no wonder that Gaz got so stuck with Teddy and didn’t want to give it back. ...He had seriously believed that Teddy was Poppy. ...So we should both really think about it best to go right again. To do Gaz more than a favor." Mark understood now why Gary had behaved like this before and wanted to disappear from the fastest way, just like Robbie.

Just the thought of hurting Gary with his bare presence made him feel more than sad, and Mark felt the tears rising to his eyes. He admitted, however, that he was glad that India was with her mother and her two other siblings, at their grandparents. Sure, for Robbie, the incident wasn’t exactly straightforward, and he could also understand why Gary had missed more than one, but still he was secretly lucky that his daughter had not intervened. Who knows how he would react?

"Maybe it would be better, though I cannot do anything for Gary, but to shine with my absence." Robbie agreed, giving him an open mind that somehow disgusted him.

 

"I think that has now become superfluous." Was shortly afterwards, the more than just worried voice from Howard out loud in the background.

To this one sentence, which seemed to come out of nowhere for the three, they threw a quick glance at their common friend, who at that moment, holding a towel in his hand, stepped back into the open. His sight was almost a laugh, but no one was laughing. The situation was simply too oppressive and sad at the same time.

"What do... What happened to you?" Jason wanted to ask first what Howard meant by the comment, but then left it and asked instead how he came to his present appearance.

Perfectly soaked, Howard stood there in front of his friends and looked through his wet curly hair, with all his hair either sticking to his face or standing by the dry scrubbing, like a drowned poodle. As he looked at the three with a serious expression, Jason, Mark, and Robbie could see right away that something was wrong. Even his easily imagined facial expressions spoke volumes. It must have happened, which Howard did not feel as good.

"If I tell you, you probably wouldn’t believe it. ...Come and see it for yourself. In a proverb it is not for nothing, a picture says a thousand words ...or maybe nothing at all." Howard didn’t know how to explain the new situation and thus his appearance.

Without much encouraging him to make a statement, Jason, Mark, and Robbie let themselves be led in by Howard. At the same time, the three of them were painting in their minds what they would see every moment. After Howard's worrying expression, they even thought of the worst.


	5. When The Depression Sets In And My Spirit Breaks

When they were all on the first floor and were standing in front of a locked door, one could see from the room behind it an even rippling. Judging from the noise, it had to be the bathroom. After Howard had opened the door and gave admission to his three friends, he also revealed to them a sight that none of them would forget in their lives. With open mouths they tried to understand this picture, but it led to absolute lack of understanding. Really at once, the nape of his neck showed up and immediately felt an icy chill running over their backs.

The sight of a fully dressed Gary sitting under an icy cold shower, holding a curled towel in his arms, was just frightening and heartbreaking at the same time. While Jason, Mark, and Robbie Gary were just staring and couldn’t put a single word over their lips, Howard preferred to stay outside the bathroom. To see his friend like that really drove him the tears in his eyes and if he had to see him longer in this condition, he couldn’t guarantee for anything. 

 

But he wasn’t the only one to whom tears came. In addition to a Jason and Mark, not even a hard-boiled Robbie was spared. He had to swallow first to realize what was happening just before him. Gary's sight dissolved in him a fear. A fear, that he might have lost him forever ...and that was his own fault. He himself had pushed his best friend into the abyss of ruin. For this reason, Gary was only a body without a soul. What in the name of God had he only done? He would gladly want to undo the happenings again, but he didn’t have something like a time machine. So he had to resign himself to the fact that he could do nothing for his mate. He had no choice but to have to look at how Gary was now encapsulating himself from the whole world and thus disappeared ever more in the eternal darkness.

 

This development was, of course, immediately apparent to a Jason, whom Gary's state of mind didn’t like at all. He had really reckoned with everything, but not with it. Even for a brief moment, he had been seriously thinking that he might dare to commit suicide. While some people would surely feel suicide as the most terrible at all, Jason had to repeat the fact. What was happening right in front of his eyes was definitely the worst thing for him. Watching one of his best friends disappear more and more into the sinking, and he could do nothing against it was hard. Jason was well aware that he couldn’t help Gary because of this backlash and that he was completely against the grain. Just for that reason, he felt a rage against himself in his heart, as well as an upset sadness. Of course, it would be easier to let this anger out of Robbie, since this one from Ayda simply let his daughter have a chat and had not thought of any consequences. But he could save the accusation. Since he knew that it would bring him nothing to blame the family Williams. Neither Ayda nor Robbie could do anything, and Teddy was much too young to understand what was happening here for a tragedy. No. Even if the three was the trigger for this present situation, he couldn’t attach them. He himself should have known better. Just because of he came to mind why Gary couldn’t have his children around him. The three, especially Daisy and Emily, reminded him too much of Dawn. He could have guessed who he was to associate Poppy with. But this insight was now much too late. 

With a much too heavy heart and a mechanical movement, he brought the water supply to the shower at some time to a halt and went down at his side. As soon as the shower head dropped only a few drops, and the regular splashing was no longer present, Gary, who pressed his face slightly in the towel, could occasionally hear a soft sob. But if you listened closely, there were also individual pieces of speech, which gave one to think. Such as "My little Poppy" or "Daddy is there", strongly suggested that Gary looked at this curled towel as his youngest and deceased daughter. Although he had again found his language, but rejoice did really no one. He had begun to talk with a towel and looked at it as a human being was not a good sign.

"Gaz?" Jason dared to break this icy silence after a felt eternity, cursing his own voice, which sounded like a second-rate and disorganized saw in his ears.

While Jason spoke to him in a laid-back and empathetic voice, he carefully placed a hand on Gary's right shoulder. But he did not react. Gary had probably fled into a world from which he could no longer reach and elicit. Jason also realized that by being the only true reaction from him, he always heard the same muttering words. They had lost Gary. What hurt him deeply Jason had the feeling that he had become the victim of a knife attack, and while his life slowly dwindled, he really slipped out of his hand. Frustrated, he let his head hang, and had to face the bitter and frightening truth in the eye. 

"We ...we've lost him!" Jason let his three other friends know that they couldn’t do anything to Gary.

 

When Mark had noticed these words from Jason, he couldn’t accept it so easily. They should seriously give up Gary? No. Not with him. He would even want to give Gary his life so that he would no longer have to live in this eternal nothingness. To see one of his best friends at all was eating him upright, and so he didn’t want to think of giving up. Never in life would he leave a friend in the lurch. He hadn’t done that at the time, and today he wouldn’t want to start with it either. In this one moment, he did not care what Jason had said in relation to his India and Robbie’s Teddy, and wanted to let Gary know that they were still there and would do anything for him. Before he went to his side, he pushed Teddy back into the arms of her father, and said, "No. No. …We don’t have. Gaz is still there. We cannot just give him up!" to his friend. While he was kneeling before him, he grabbed Gary by the shoulders and shook him lightly.

"Come on, Gaz. Please don’t do this to us. I know you're still somewhere in there. It would be enough for me if you gave me any sign that you were still there. Don’t let this darkness fill your heart to a will-less Marionette. Please. Fight against it. You just have to. ...No one of us wants to lose you and you know we would do everything for you. Just, I beg of you, not to give up. I guarantee you we will not let you down in any case and give up. ...So, please. Do me the favor and give us only a small sign so we know you are still in our world." Mark tried to persuade Gary that he could no longer give himself to this darkness and asked him for a tiny sign of life.

Since Mark didn’t get the desired response, he carefully placed his slightly bent forward friend into a wall-leaning position. The subsequent sight of Gary frightened Mark, as well as a Jason and Robbie, even more than this before. Gary looked terrible. One of Robbie's blue-blown faces radiated him rightly, while in contrast, he showed an unusual pallor. Even his gentle face was so deep that Gary, with his forty-two years, was much older than he really should. His slightly bloodshot and swollen eyes did their other things, emphasizing Gary's bad condition visibly. Since Gary had the impression not to have heard a single word from Mark, the little one had desperately sought the eye contact. …Vain. Gary had now completely disappeared. While he had tried to take a look at his tortured soul, he also noticed a change in the pupils, where the beautiful and gentle blue-green had manifested itself to a darker color. When, shortly afterwards, a tear had evaporated from one of the corners of his eyes, and gulped down slowly over Gary's cheek, it had all happened to Mark. At this sight, he could do nothing else than to leave the bathroom. To see Gary so much pained him more than he confessed to himself, and suddenly felt an emerging emptiness threatening him into the deep black abyss. To get rid of this feeling as soon as possible, he had to get out of here quickly.


	6. Now The Heaven’s Falling Around Us

Only Jason and Robbie remained behind. While the latter wanted to resemble Mark, he remained stiff and couldn’t turn away from Gary's sight. The shock was literally written in his face. He could not even get a clear idea. In contrast, Jason looked quite different. There were thousands of questions fluttering around his head, where he didn’t even have a single answer. It made him almost mad that he had failed miserably and lost the thread to Gary. To all the thousand questions came another, and so he wondered whether he should go to a possible career as a psychiatrist or not. Gary's gaze really made him wonder whether he should really put this idea into practice. However, Jason also had to admit that in this case he wasn’t the right one for Gary. Just because of Gary was his friend ...his brother. 

Because of this new development, Jason didn’t have much left to give Gary professional help. But what was more difficult for him. This also meant that an admission into a psychiatric institution was inevitable! Before his mind's eye, he already saw how his friend had to sit in one for his remaining life. God, how could he explain that to Gary's mother ...and, above all, to his children? This sole thought jarred Jason even more than anything else. But before he could do it, he should first see that Gary came from his wet clothes and was thus dry. In his condition, he could very easily get rid of pneumonia, and the question is whether he will be able to overcome it.

"Hey, Rob. Will you give me a towel, please?" Jason asked for one of the terrycloth towels after an occasional eternity, his mate Robbie.

Instead of Jason doing this favor, he was still frozen and couldn’t take his eyes off his best friend. Even on a repeat of Jason, Robbie still did not return to the same place, although Jason had spoken to him in a slightly louder voice. Jason glanced up at him questioningly and had to say that he had never seen him like this before. As Robbie stood in his way, he straightened up and led him back to the bedroom, where he pressed him carefully into a sofa, which was stood in a corner. He also noticed that even Howard had now left the room and had probably followed Mark. With this thought that he was probably in the kitchen and hopefully prepared a hot cup of tea for all of them, he went back to the bathroom and grabbed one of the large terrycloth towels. When Jason was back at Gary, he put it around his shoulders and tried to persuade him to leave "Poppy" for a brief moment. At first, nothing happened to Gary, but Jason eventually thought Gary had loosened his grip slightly, and he dared to take a tear-wet towel out of his arms. Without a big counter-attack, Gary let it go, and was soon afterwards brought by Jason with cautious handcuffs on his two extremely wobbly legs, whereby Gary also immediately threatened to tip back forward. But before he could do it, he held him in a safe and short hug until he put one of his arms around his shoulder and grabbed Gary's waist with the other hand. So Jason led his boyfriend, shoulder to shoulder, into the bedroom then put him on the edge of the bed.

With the toweling cloth around Gary's shoulders, he rubbed him as well as he could dry again. After he had freed him of the wet clothes and overpowered him with much trouble, Jason didn’t know what to do with him. He wanted to get him out into the sun again, so Gary could get rid of the rest of the cold, which he had stored under his skin from the icy shower. But in this state and without help, it wasn’t easy to bring him down the stairs. So he was now faced with the decision to leave him here, while somebody kept an eye on Gary, or he picked up one of his present friends, who could help him. In the end, he decided to let him out into the fresh air. Just as he looked at Gary in the pale and cold light of the bedroom, he wanted to know him outside in the garden rather than up here. Since Robbie was sitting in the corner with his Teddy in his arms, Jason could quickly find Howard and ask for help. Okay. He could have asked Robbie for help. But this was still a bit stiff from the new situation and there was also Teddy, which he pressed lovingly lightly on his chest. Mark, who was the most unsuitable of his body size, he didn’t need to ask, and so Howard remained the only one he could ask for help. So Jason went downwind, where he found Howard in the suspected kitchen. Although Howard had a slight discomfort with this request, he turned to Jason and gave him a favor. With Howard's help, Jason Gary could get back into the warm sun. 

 

As soon as Gary sat with his eyes tightly pressed together in the erected chair, he immediately got up on his two legs and ran back inside. Because of Gary's sudden and new state of mind, this "outburst" came quite surprising and so Howard and Jason could only see behind him for a fraction of a second, and then stuck at his heels. At first they feared that he would be able to visit the bathroom again, and once again allow himself an icy shower. But what happily wasn’t the case and so he crawled instead into the darkest corner, which he could find. When he thought he had found it, Gary crawled as deeply into this as he could. After he had pulled his legs to his upper body, Gary clutched them and left his head with his eyes closed. This sight brought Howard and Jason into a ponder until the former finally came to mind, which is why Gary had suddenly taken off and pulled back here. With this, Howard Jason approached his theory that their common friend avoided the brightness and wanted to find his salvation rather in the dark. Since this theory made sense, Jason had to stand by himself that he could have come by himself. 

"I'm sorry, Gaz. I really didn’t want that. I could’ve imagined that daylight would be too bright for you." Jason tried to sincerely apologize, hoping Gary had heard his words somehow.

On his excuse, Gary didn’t react but he thought he had heard as this asked for "Poppy". Jason nodded briefly with his head, straightened up and only meant that he was right there again. In a hurry, he went to the first floor, where he stormed into the bathroom and after less than a minute, he came back with one of the rolled-up terrycloth towels under his arms. At Gary's side, he pressed it in his arms.

"Here. ...There you have her." Jason whispered to him.

After the terry towel had found the way to Gary's arms and he pressed it lightly to his chest, Jason re-established himself with mixed feelings. With Howard at his side, the two could no longer turn their gaze away from Gary.

"And how is it going to go now? We cannot leave Gaz to his fate. We must be able to do something for him." Howard was afraid of what might happen to Gary when they did nothing.  
"We have nothing else to do. Gaz needs proper and professional help. ...I'm afraid an admission into a psychiatric institution is inevitable." Jason had no choice but to take the illusion to Howard that they could not do anything to Gary, so they had to face the unfortunate future, and added in the end, with a rather sad voice, "...The only thing I can do is to make an unpleasant phone call with Gary's mum. I can imagine how she will react when she heard that her youngest son has completely given up."

When Jason talked about being admitted to a psychiatric institution, Howard already had a picture of how his best buddy was vegetating in such a setting for his remaining life, until he finally left him and followed Dawn and Poppy. With this image, Howard's face instantly changed color and he felt more than a cold chill running across his back. In order to get rid of this picture, he rubbed his face with a light frost, and hoped to regain his color. All this has been way too much for Howard. He was absolutely against the grain, that he was condemned to watch, as Gary slowly but surely died. This couldn’t and shouldn’t be the end. On this imagination, Howard had to sit down and settle on the opposite wall on the ground. As his gaze glided over to Gary and stared at him, he only came to the edge of the way Jason was a little distant to lead this said and feared telephone conversation with Gary's mother.


	7. I’m Sad, Sad That I Hurted You

In the meantime, Mark and Robbie, who seemed to be more than capable of finally finding their way back to the side of their mutual friend, looked at him anxiously and intently. The present picture of a completely self-absorbed Gary was a little better than he had been sitting under the icy cold shower, but he still made a frightening impression. Neither of them could accept the fact that they had lost Gary. His soul had disappeared. Only the body was left behind.

At some point, Jason joined again, who had finished the confirmed and quite feared phone conversation with Gary's mother, and threw a more than just worried look down at his soulless friend.

"Was that Gary’s Mum?" Mark asked cautiously with a barely existing voice.  
"Yes. ...As you can imagine it, she isn’t at all pleased with this development. She even shouted at me why I didn’t tell her about the meeting here and gives me also the blame for what happened. ...Anyway, she tries to get here as soon as possible. What's going to happen in three hours." Jason nodded to him briefly and betrayed in the same breath as the conversation with her had gone.  
"She gives you the sole fault ...and not me?" Robbie asked cautiously and didn’t even understand the underlying logic.

Jason glanced at Robbie's ice-blue eyes, where he could read that he was blaming himself. So Robbie also got his desired answer, Jason nodded to him only mute. Robbie would’ve preferred it if Gary's mother blamed him instead of giving it all to Jason. Okay. Maybe Jason forgot to tell her what about this meeting, but she couldn’t put a rope around his neck and impose all the blame. He was the one who was guilty of Gary's present condition. He and not Jason. 

The following three hours were more than just a test of patience for the friends. To one they didn’t know what to do and on the other hand, they couldn’t do anything. It was a pure back and forth, where no one at the end knew where his own head stood. Especially at the sight of their common friend. They had seriously expected that Gary would get out of his skin today and take a step forward, but instead he had made several backwards. While waiting for the arrival of Marjorie, they also witnessed Gary "Poppy" pretending to calm her down or so she could fall asleep peacefully. A terry towel, what had to be singing for what was disturbing but as Gary also wanted to make a bottle of warm milk and give it to her, Jason made another phone call, which hurt a lot in his heart. 

 

But at any rate three hours passed, and the door bells were heard through all the rooms.

"It would probably be Gary's Mum." Howard thought to know who had to be, and then went to the large front door to let the visitor in here.  
After Howard had opened the door and immediately looked into Marjorie's anxious and haggard face, she also asked furiously about where her boy was. Without giving her a big answer, Howard took her by the arm and led Gary's mother to the others and thus to her son. When the two of them arrived at the friends and Marjorie saw Gary, she was instantly on his side.  
"Gary. My boy. How do you look like? What did Jason do to you?" Marjorie thought that Gary's red-blown face was coming from Jason, and she asked afterwards, "What's the matter with you, darling?"

But as with the desperate attempts of his friends, Gary even showed his mother not even the desired reaction, which somehow had hoped. The only interaction he was doing at this time was more the terry towel in his arms. 

"What in God's name did you do to him?" She turned to Jason.  
Jason was about to explain, when suddenly Robbie raised his voice and came out with it: "Marge please. Don’t give Jason all the blame. Okay. He may have failed to inform you of our meeting here. Therefore, it is only a partial fault. Where’s the main fault, is actually more with me to be found. I ...I did not think about it, and I missed Gaz unintentionally. Besides, I should’ve gone home after Ayda pushed Teddy into my arms."  
"And the other blow?" She pointed to one of the other cheeks, which also had a red-bluish color.  
"I admit that I have acted perfectly rationally." Robbie admitted at the same time that he was also responsible for the second stroke and that he had distributed it with full consciousness.

On this guilty confession, all those present who still had their senses looked at to Robbie and marveled at his excuse. Not just because of the words, but much more to the question, who’s now had the most blame. 

"I really appreciate what you're trying to do. But please, Rob. You wouldn’t have had to do that." Jason Robbie's attempt to blame himself was not exactly necessary.  
"No offense, Jay. But I did not do this for you now, but much more about my own person. ...This is all my fault and not yours. You've really tried to get Gaz back on his feet. But then I got trampled by an ass and had to destroy everything. ...And I swore to myself, never to hurt him again!" Robbie didn’t want Jason to misunderstand it, and finally gave himself the sole fault, with the tears rising to his eyes and adding with a small voice, "I have to get out of here. …I am sorry."

Immediately after his excuse, Robbie was already out in the garden, Mark calling him afterwards calling himself at his heels and thus followed.


	8. One Step Forward Two Steps Behind

As soon as Robbie and Mark had once again separated from the group, the door bell was pressed again. But this time, the sound sounded slightly different than usual. That meant someone was standing at the gate and asking for admission. It had to be something foreign, in any case, because otherwise this person would have probably used his number code and the corresponding key. Since Jason had such a clue as to who this might be, he nevertheless carefully questioned who was and what he wanted. On the question, he already got the answer that these on the recommendation of the physician Dr. Pierce came to bring someone to the Sunflower Clinic, a psychiatric institution. With a heavy heart and a slight hesitation, Jason pushed the button to open the gate and allowed it to enter. After Jason had opened the front door and left it equally open - he returned with mixed feelings.

"Who was that?" Marjorie wanted to know from Jason who was the unannounced visitor, when he looked again.

With this question, Jason stayed where he was at the time and did not even dare to get closer to Gary's mother. How would she absorb it when she heard that he had contacted Gary's physician and that he had also tried to get Gary to a place in a psychiatric institution? So he looked helplessly at the ground and just didn’t know how and where to start.

"I ...I... I had no other choice. But you should know that what I’ve done ...it was been extremely difficult for me. It hurts me deeply, and I am also extremely sorry, but Gary's doctor was also of the opinion that ... an admission into a psychiatric institution is inevitable." Jason gave himself the greatest trouble for an excuse.   
"You really did let my boy into a psychiatric institution?" Marjorie then expressed her resentment and was not enthusiastic about the move that Jason had made.  
"I had to inform Gary's doctor at least about the new development. You should’ve seen him before, when he had sung a lullaby to the terry cloth. ...Or how he wanted to start an attempt to make a bottle of milk and give it to it." Jason tried to get her the picture, which Gary had not tried an hour ago.

This picture gave Marjorie some thought. Even if she didn’t want to admit it, she had to stand by herself that Jason had done the only thing right. At least, informing the physician. So she took her son immediately in the arms and whispered to him a few words, which Jason didn’t even hear in the approach. 

Shortly thereafter, a voice was heard from the entrance area, announcing their arrival and asking where they had to go. Without offering much for this task, Howard suddenly rose from his seated position on the wall and went towards the guys with the I-Love-Me jacket to steer them in the right direction. A few seconds later, Howard returned with three young men, revealing to them the image of a nameless misery that had distanced itself from the whole world and could not begin to do anything with his own person. Before they took Gary away, Jason went back to his knees before his friend and took him into his arms. A hug   
would probably still be in there, before he left Gary in the care of the doctors. 

"I'm so sorry, Gaz. But you leave us no choice. ...I'll get you to visit as often as I can." Jason let him know that he was still there for him and helped Gary to get on his two very wobbly legs.

 

The boys in the white clothes wanted to take over Gary, when he was about to trudge forward again. But since Jason was still at his side, he could catch the fall to the ground by taking Gary back into his arms. With Howard, he managed to get their common friend out and to go to the van. 

Marjorie could only see with mixed feelings how her youngest son had chosen to flee into a world where he gave himself to the eternal darkness, waiting only for God to finally redeem him and take him to himself. Even though the hope eventually died, she hoped that the doctors could help their Gary return to this world. The tears rose to her more than hot, she did not want to lose him. Not even four years ago had she already lost her husband, whom she still deeply missed and in this one moment very special. That wasn’t fair. Halfway from the main building to the van, she stopped and tried to understand that she couldn’t prevent the whole thing.

 

Even Mark, who watched everything quietly and secretly from the inside out, could no longer let his tears to be denied. At the sight of Howard and Jason bringing Gary to the van, a tear rattled over his cheek, and so it didn’t take long until a whole burst of tears came from his eyes. Overwhelmed by the tears, he leaned against a wall and sank to the ground, completely exhausted, until he took a sitting position. He pulled his legs up to his chest and clutched them as if he had no one in the world who took him in a warm embrace. The loss of Gary's soul hurt him tremendously. He would follow his friend in the world where he was now. But this access was not granted to him. He had to stay outside and watch Gary getting away from him more and more. When he heard from afar how the doors of the Vans were closed and drove away shortly afterwards, he instantly got up on his feet and ran into Gary's music room, where he locked himself up. Knowing that Gary was gone, he wanted to be somehow close to him and that was best in a place where they felt connected.

 

So it happened that Gary was admitted to a psychiatric institution and where he was under the supervision of doctors. Who knows, maybe they could get Gary to build a new life. But this uncertain future still stood in the stars. Whether Gary could be brought back at all, there was a completely different question. At first, one had to try to get into his world and then, very slowly, to bring him back to reality on the right track. But that was a difficult undertaking. For this, Gary had to be willing to let himself be led by a savage person. With Jason, he had had someone by his side, which he had left behind and, in a certain way, had given him his confidence. To whom would he still turn aside, if he deprived him of the favored trusted person? The likelihood that Gary would completely surrender to the darkness, leaving nothing and nobody to himself was a hundred percent. As soon as that happens, the doctors could not do anything more ...and that’s exactly what happened.


	9. I Can Hear You Calling Me

Meanwhile, Gary was almost four months in this Sunflower clinic and the doctors there didn’t know how to get to him. Already from the first day, Gary had been completely isolated and had even refused to eat. In order to keep Gary strong, he was forced to eat something at the beginning. At some point, they had a look with him and as they didn’t want to persevere in the long run, a new method was conceived, so that he at least received a sufficient portion of food. However, the new version wasn’t even better than the one under violence. This was only a modified form, where he had to suffer less and so Gary was simply sedated, whereupon he was compelled as if by a coma patient.

If Gary was not forcibly fed, he usually sat with his eyes closed and a pillow in his arms in a corner, and only vegetated in front of him. Just as his distant friends had already it feared. The doctor team had already seen everything possible, but someone like Gary they had never seen before. It wasn’t easy to cope with the loss of two people at the same time, but at some point the mourning person had to be pitiable to pity himself all day long and at the very least to take a cautious look outside. Dawns and Poppy's death was now over a year ago, since it would be really time to finally get up and turn back to life. The proverb, the time heals all wounds, was not quite right in this sense. Time might help you to forget, but to heal the wounds, rather less. Forget, that was the key point! 

When the four months were fully achieved, Gary was finally allowed to see some familiar faces. Although he was allowed to visit once a month, this privilege was first denied him. What even a Jason couldn’t understand at all. He and the others had a certain right to visit, but they were not granted on request. Even the reason for this was completely incomprehensible.

... "Gary should get used to life here first!" ...

For the friends it sounded so that the doctors wanted to keep him there forever. Say, his remaining life. Even the then and initially argument that the whole thing had to be begun and started again, wasn’t fruitful at all. 

On the day the doors were opened for visitors, only Howard and Jason could be seen. Mark and Robbie didn’t want to, as they did not want to make Gary with their mere presence any more sorrow and grief. What Howard had meant, that it was not possible at all. In his opinion, Gary had already reached his low point and that was a weak excuse in his eyes. Then the two had added that the image of a Gary in a psychiatric institution was repugnant to them. What Howard, but then understood. He couldn’t help it, but he didn’t want to leave his friend in the lurch and see how he was. Actually, Marjorie wanted to see for him as well, but overnight, Daniel suddenly fell ill with a heavy flu and so she could not arrange to her suffering.

The walk to Gary proved to be more difficult for Howard and Jason with every step. The closer they came to their mutual friend, the more nervous they became. How had he been going so far? What impression would he have on them? Two questions they were only then answered, as soon as they stood before Gary. This one moment, which the two had already longed for three months, also gave them an uncomfortable feeling. What would they see in the next few minutes? The same picture as the last time they saw him, or did they have to face an unpleasant truth? As far as the latter was concerned, it was probably not because otherwise they would have received a message.

 

After an eternal waiting time, they entered the common room with a few other visitors. Howard and Jason immediately looked around for Gary, but they could not find him.

"Where’s Gaz? Have you seen him yet?" Asked Howard Jason as he continued to gaze through the common room and searched for his mate.  
"No." Jason pointed out.  
"Do you think they put him in a rubber cell?" Howard felt uneasy and feared that Gary could have been locked away.  
"Do not talk nonsense. This isn’t a movie here, and besides, no one is now put in a rubber cell. At the very least, tied to the bed and rested under drugs, but no more. ...He's gonna be somewhere." Jason Howard's imagine was completely out of the question, and he immediately told him that such times had long since been overtaken.

As soon as Jason had pronounced the last sentence, he went to one of the nurses around and asked where they could find Gary. The nurse looked at Jason, slightly surprised and wanted to tell him where the wanted person was, when Gary's assigned physician joined him and told the nurse that he was going to do it.

"I'll take care of that. Keep the position. …Hello. I am Dr. Mercer. Mister Barlow's doctor. You're two of his closest friends, right?" He asked Howard and Jason.  
"Correct. ...I'm Jason Orange and he's Howard Donald." Jason introduced himself and his friend, as they reached out to greet their hands  
"But you should know that we are more than just friends. ...We’re like brothers. Can we get to him?" Howard let him know at once how they really stood together and couldn’t wait any longer to come to Gary.  
"Of course." Dr. nodded Mercer only and instructed the two to follow him, "Follow me."  
"What can you tell me about his condition?" Jason wanted to know before, because he didn’t want to be completely unprepared, which could be on him at once.   
"I wish I could tell you that he’s still like that on the day of his briefing. But to be honest, he has since given up completely and has now become unachievable to us. He doesn’t even let his trusty doctor approach him. …He's just vegetating." The doctor had no choice but to tell the truth about Gary's condition.

Howard and Jason were about to make their thoughts about the bad news, but at that moment they were already in front of Gary's room. Instantly their hearts pounded so hard against their chests that it was already hurt. After Dr. Mercer had opened the door, the two friends, holding their breath, entered the bright-lit room. Immediately their anxious glances glided to a somewhat descended Gary, who had entrenched himself with a pillow in his arms in a corner and did not even make the slightest movement. There was also a yellowish puddle, which smelled strongly of urine. As Dr. Mercer noticed this, he couldn’t refuse the words, "Not again.", and immediately called for a cleansing power. 

"Not again?" Jason could only repeat his words, wondering how many times that had happened.  
"This is due to the clonidine. He's too tired to go to the bathroom." The physician explained immediately about the following circumstances.  
"Clonidine? What is it?"Jason wanted to know what that was.  
"A sedative. As he refuses to eat, we have no choice but to quiet and compel him. A side effect of clonidine is fatigue. We could give him something like diazepam, but there is a risk that he might become dependent on it. Of the many other and even more unpleasant side effects I do not want to begin. ...On the other hand, the clonidine is much more harmless and can be administered much more easily for him." Let Dr. Mercer Jason knew what clonidine was doing, while a cleansing power was concerned with removing the urine and then draining Gary's draining.

To explain what clonidine was, Jason suddenly felt bad. Though he was aware that it was only to keep Gary at bay, but still he felt a sense of compulsive feeding in the first weeks in a less ruthless way.

"Just say it that you had him the food in the first weeks pure beaten!" Howard could no longer keep his imagination to himself and thus had the same thought as Jason.  
"So really, I don’t have to offer that now. We have never anticipated our patients that we don’t appear to be right. Our institution is clean, exalted above every prejudice, and has received only good resonances from former patients." Denied Dr. Mercer the fact’s that Howard was right with his accusation, leaving his workplace in a good light.  
"And what did you pay for them so that your so-called patients would take such a lie?" Howard gave him no faith, knowing that things were not quite right.

 

Jason suddenly grabbed Howard by the arm, took a few steps to the side, and with a lowered voice said to his friend that he should be held back: "Doug! I beg you. Hold back with your excuses. It doesn’t bring us much now, if you speak every single cliché and prejudice of a psychiatric institution ...and then also before the medical staff."  
"I'm sorry. That was not my intention. I did not want to say that at all, but where I now have to see Gaz in a place like this, it just came over me." Howard apologized for his overreaction in the same vocal frequency and just didn’t understand, how Jason could be so calm, "And I also cannot understand that you have no problems with it. How can you be so calm? I could now take Gaz under my arms and disappear with him in the fastest way."  
"But you are completely wrong. On the outside, I seem to be a little too quiet, but inside of me it’s bubbles like in Yellowstone Park. ...I am exactly like you think that it must have been quite different in the beginning. But we must remain calm, even if it is difficult for us. ...So please, give yourself at least trouble. Okay?"  
"I'm trying what I can, but I cannot promise anything." Howard could not give him a 100% guarantee.

Jason nodded, thanking him briefly and as the cleaning power was ready he turned to Gary. After a few steps he was at his side and then went to his knees before him.

"Gaz? ...Hey! It's me, Jay and Doug is here too." Jason started the first vague attempt to get his mate out of his lethargy.

When Jason mentioned his name, Howard walked over to his friend, went to his knees before him, and while he laid a hand on Gary's shoulder, he could only say, "Hey mate." with a thin voice.

As Gary did not react on like Jason or Howard's words, the two of them took their mutual friend into a group hug. The two of them whispered to Gary again and again, so that he could feel their presence. No matter how. The main thing was that he knew his friends were thinking about him. At some point, Howard thought he had even heard a few low-pitched words in his ears, which’s sounded like "Get me out of here!". Although he wished that Gary would give him only a small telltale sign, he thought that this was a fancy. It had to be one, it couldn’t be otherwise.


	10. Maybe We’ll Lose Ourselves

"Dr. Mercer. I should ask you if you already have the consent." Suddenly a voice came out of the background.  
"Not now, Nick." Tried Dr. Mercer stifled an incoming clerk and wanted to make it clear that this was not the right moment.  
"But Dr. Garner wants to know if he can start with his preparations around Mister Barlows ...!" The nurse remained obstinate, so he didn’t know what was happening in the background and when he discovered Howard and Jason, he immediately interrupted himself.

When this nurse talked about some sort of preparations, mentioning Gary's name, Howard and Jason reigned and released Gary from an intimate and warm hug. With a huge question mark over their heads, the two of them saw each other alternately to the doctor and this almost rattled nurse. Preparations? For what? What should that mean again? What adventurous measure did they want to have Gary subjected to?

"What preparations? What on earth are you going to do with Gary?" Jason wanted to know what it was about.

Dr. Mercer glanced at the two friends and then turned to Gary, who was still motionless in his corner. Somehow the doctor seemed to be wrestling with the words. Not knowing where to start. It was obviously unpleasant for him to take their measure. How likely was it that this was not quite the typical healing process and could have a considerable aftertaste? The suspicion grew increasingly as the doctor once breathed a sigh of relief and tried to clarify the approach.

"As there are no signs of improvement and he doesn’t even respond to our treatment in any way, we’ve no choice but to take a drastic measure."

Howard and Jason looked at each other to confirm their assumption and got a bad feeling at the same time. While Jason was still kneeling on Gary's side, Howard immediately went to his two legs and took a step forward until he stood between his little friend and the doctor.

"You will do nothing of the sort. No matter what it may be, you will not get too close to him or even twinkle’s a tiny hair." Howard, without much thought, let out his protective instinct.  
"Listen. I can well understand that you want to protect a friend who needs help and also your friendship in all honors, but you shouldn’t question my work. We want only the best for him. If he is to find a way back to life, please let me do my work." The doctor Howard tried to make clear that they all had the same goal and that one should let him do his work. 

Howard gave him an embittered look, and went back to Gary's side, defeated and somewhat reluctantly. That he couldn’t protect his friend and was so damned to watch, as Gary was helpless to the doctors, he just couldn’t look. Slowly, a deep emptiness rose in him, where he felt he was in an airless room.

 

"And how is your measure to look?" Jason tried to find something to frighten him.  
"Have you ever heard of Honoré de Balzac?" He asked back.  
"Do you mean the French writer? What does he have to do with Gary now?" Jason could start with the name after all and was thus a concept, but did not understand what Dr. Mercer wanted.  
"Actually nothing, but he had once said something, which is the key to our success. ...The memories embellish life, but forgetting alone makes it bearable." Tried Dr. Mercer to him by means of an old and wise saying, the further proceeding cautiously communicates.  
"You ...you’re serious about wanting to take his memories? You can not be serious about it?" Jason had a dark foreboding, what the doctor wanted to tell them.  
"I'm sorry. But this is the only way to get him back on the right track. There is no other alternative. ...This is the only chance for him to build a new life." Nodded Mercer confessed to him, pointing out that he saw Gary's future otherwise black when they didn’t take his memories of him.  
"No. No. You cann’t do it to him. ...When you take all the memories of Gaz, you also take his life at the same time. What you're up to is beyond torture." Howard couldn’t allow that.

To begin with, the food was beaten in Gary was a thing, but now he wanted to take his memories. No. This was clearly too far for him. In this way, Gary not only lost his identity, but he could become a completely different person as well. Howard liked his friend the way he was. Even his little quirks, which he now missed something like this. In the worst case, he wouldn’t want to be friends with him afterwards. What was like a nightmare for Howard. He wanted to keep him in his own memories as he had been, and not as a Gary, whom he did not even know.

"What kind of life should we take from him? He is only vegetating, that one can no longer call life. ...I admit openly that the process looks like torture, but it allows him to build a new and better life with his children. ...It can ultimately prove to be an advantage for him." The doctor tried to explain to him that it was only for Gary.  
"First of all, he already had the perfect life and besides, I meant more like that for me personally is like a torture and I bet that Mark and Robbie wouldn’t do it differently. ...But thank you for the picture, now I feel very badly." Howard was initially more interested in the whole thing on himself.  
"I think you are overdramatised this now. How do you come up with the insane idea, that personally? You should help him so that he can find himself again in this world." Mercer, Howard took the whole thing too close and personal.  
"That's exactly the point. Do you think it will be easy for us to have a look at how Gary is wandering around without any memory and no longer recognizing his entire world? He'll feel like an alien being kidnapped by his home planet and exposed to another." Howard let him know how he saw it and what Gary could feel.  
"I have to agree with him. Gary's entire world always consisted of music and his family. I can imagine how it goes when he meets his children again. At the latest from this point onwards he would ask himself what the mother from the three had become. To take the memory of him doesn’t bring too much. ...Apart from that, you forget that he has now moved up to England in a national sanctuary. What do you think about how he will react to the many fans out of there? If I were him, I would either hide or run away at all times. ...In my opinion, there is the danger that Gary could fall back into old patterns." Jason tried to explain to the doctor with arguments that this should be different.  
"I admit that there is a certain residual risk. But we’ve to do something and that is the better option for your friend than to let him be vegetated in this institution all his life. ...I can hardly imagine that you really want that." The doctor knew about Jason's concerns and showed him the picture, if they did nothing at all and left Gary in this condition.

On the last sentence, Jason looked up at the doctor and admitted that he was right in the one point. He definitely didn’t want to see how Gary had to spend the rest of his life here and eventually died in a miserable state. No. The image was clearly disgusting to him. So something had to happen. But did they have to go so radically and delete the memories? Was there no other option? ...According to Dr. Mercer does not. 

"And how ...how do you want to do that?" Jason asked, in a tone of voice, as he wanted to take Gary's memories forever.  
"With an electric shock therapy!" The doctor finally said after a dramatic silence.  
"You ...you want to shock him? What kind of bunk is that? Dr. Frankenstein's cave?" Howard thought he had been interrogated and tried to cover his disrespect, as good as he could, but he did not really succeed.  
"Yes. Is there no other option? I mean, we don’t live in the year nineteenhundredforty. Can not be solved with antidepressants?" Jason also found this method quite questionable.  
"Unfortunately, no. He already has antidepressants and since there has been no improvement, we have no choice but to go on the radical tour. ...I'm sorry." Apologized Dr. Mercer went on to make sure that it was no different and betrayed by the way, as they had to imagine, "The goal of the therapy will be the anterior cingulate cortex, where his emotional memory of experience sits. By means of bilateral electrodes and a high-frequency sinusoidal wave stimulation, we will shock him with a regulator turned up to the top and thus interrupt the protein synthesis. This changes his neurotransmitter system and the end result is that he no longer has memories. ...Everyday functions such as walking, talking or shoemaking are not affected at all."

 

Howard and Jason looked at each other indifferently and didn’t know rightly whether they should go to this daring proposal or not. In addition, they couldn’t make any decision, since it was not without Gary's mother and her consent. Although she trusted Jason, she had given him something like a partial power. Only with consultation, he could also be approved for emergency and even only in exceptional cases. The question was there only whether Marjorie agreed firstly in this therapy and secondly, whether it was already enough for him with a blessed partial power that could possibly sign it. On the other hand, she would also definitely want to be there, if it should come at all. There he was sure.

"If we were to agree, when would they want to do it?" Although Jason had in his background that there were already preparations, he asked immediately, how quickly Dr. Mercer wanted to bring this thing across the table.  
"Well. To be honest and if it goes after me, still today. ...I would also unlike to wait a long time." He said.  
"Today? Why so fast?" Howard understood not even the slightest, which is why they urged them to hurry and could imagine where the reason was, "Are you afraid that Gary today’s still showing an improvement and he told some secret practices?"   
"Slowly it's enough for me with your wild fantasies and false accusations. I can understand that outsiders see this as a place of horror and feel it as quite questionable, but we also do our work and that every day. All the many patients who want to help under difficult conditions it’s not always easy. Sometimes you have to go through a bit harder to achieve an improvement at all, but we make sure that no inhuman activities occur. I assure you that no serious damage has been inflicted on your friend." Dr. Mercer wouldn’t let himself be taken by Howard any more, and after he had brought him close to the everyday difficulties that occured at times, he wanted to know from him whether he had understood that, "Have you that understood?"

Before Howard somehow responded to it or even could say something, he was again couched by Jason coarsely by the arm and then entered shortly afterwards with the words, "Please excuse us briefly. We need to make a very urgent call.", out into the corridor.   
After the two friends had gone out of the room, Jason Howard grabbed his wide shoulders and while he looked at him with a firm look, he wanted to know what was wrong with him: "Doug. What in God's Name is only going with you? So I've never seen you before. Can you please tell me why you are doing so? You behave like the proverbial ax in the forest ...and don’t say that it is still about Gaz alone."

Howard looked shortly thereafter in Jason's deep blue eyes, then looked down at the ground, where he stammered something before him and didn’t know what to say to him. The other problem was that he himself had no idea why he was so.

"I ...I don’t know it for myself. ...All this is just terrible and now I think I would’ve stayed better at home. ...How did I get to the silly idea of escorting you? Mark and Rob were absolutely right. I was already aware that it wouldn’t be easy to see Gaz here in such a place like this, but I didn’t expect it to be so hard. ...Gaz is a very good friend of mine and as I do it with you, Mark and Rob, I still hang on him. I can’t just look like this, how "Dr. Frankenstein" takes the memories by one of my best friends. ...What... what kind of brain-burnt suggestion is that? I ask myself how one can call something like therapy at all. I don’t know how you see it, but for me it almost equals like a ...like a murder." Howard finally brought tear-struck and felt this therapy more than just a murderous act.  
"Like a murder?" Jason repeated Howard's comparison, which he still did not quite understand why.  
"You know that Gaz has a rational and profound fear of dying. If you take him any remembrance now, he might lose that fear and is be more suicidal than usual. ...I don’t want to wake up one morning and someone told me that Gaz is dead." Howard tried to bring this aspect closer to him.  
"Doug. ...Please don’t take the devil to the wall. I admit that this point shouldn’t be disregarded ...but as I know you, there is more behind it. Come on, what are you really about?" Jason had to give him right in one point and urged his friend to answer.  
"What ... what if he does not want to be friends with us at all? I only want to restore my old Gary, is that asking too much? What we have to five is very important to me and Gaz is an important part of it. If someone takes his memories of our time together, he takes it to me. ...It's like a betrayal of ourselves." Howard finally expressed his fears and could not prevent a single tear from fleeing from his corner of his eye.  
"Simply said, you're scared. Fear of losing more than a friend! ...Our time together." Jason understood why Howard behaved so untypical.

More precisely, it wasn’t Howard himself who gave this behavior. It was his fear that caused him to do so. An anxiety, that Jason could understand too well. So he had to admit that he had also imagined it differently and he didn’t want this therapy Gary to the slightest. Gary had definitely deserved better than letting any strangers take his memories. ...First of all, their common times.

Howard nodded at him sniffling and trying to swallow the hot tears. Shortly after, he found himself in a friendly embrace with Jason, who betrayed him by the way, that he had similar fears. But they had to face their own fears, even if it was difficult. As it looked, there was no way around it.

After they had loosened from their embrace, Jason reached for his phone and tried to reach Gary's Mum. To tell her how Gary was doing and that the doctors didn’t see any future for him. At least not so long until all the memories was eradicated him and thus a   
new beginning in prospect.


End file.
